London: Ahead of this weekend's summit in the English county of Cornwall, development organizations have called for greater efforts by the rich industrial nations in the G7 to combat climate change.
Carbon dioxide emissions must be reduced faster and to much lower levels than previously promised, and financial commitments for climate protection and the necessary adjustments in poorer countries must also be expanded, they demanded on Wednesday.
"What is on the table now is not enough," Joern Kalinski of Oxfam International said on Wednesday ahead of the G7 summit in the village of Carbis Bay, in the remote south-west of the country.
The heads of state and government from the United States, Germany, Britain, Canada, France, Italy and Japan, as well as EU representatives, are meeting from Friday to Sunday for their summit in the Cornish seaside resort.
In addition to the pandemic, the fight against global warming is one of the central topics ahead of the UN climate change conference -known as COP26 - in the Scottish city of Glasgow in November.
The G7 countries have not kept their earlier pledges to provide around 100 billion dollars a year in climate change assistance to developing countries, complained Kalinski.
Oxfam estimates that this climate aid has so far only amounted to $39 billion. Half of this money is to be used by poorer countries to expand protection against climate change and make themselves more resilient to impacts such as extreme weather.
In May, the highest level of carbon dioxide concentrations to date was measured, Dirk Bathe of the German aid agency World Vision pointed out. If anything, the levels are continuing to rise. With warming, the susceptibility to diseases is increasing.
"It is up to the G7 to say: we have a threat on our doorstep. If we don't see how to deal with it, it will come in through the door," Bathe said.
Before the summit, G7 finance ministers agreed, at least in principle, to increase climate aid to poorer countries.
In 2019, Germany for example allocated 6.8 billion euros ($8.3 billion) for this purpose.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel must "pledge to double German climate aid by 2025" at the G7 summit, Oxfam expert Kalinski demanded.
"Finance Minister Olaf Scholz must no longer block this - and she must no longer hide behind him." — dpa
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